Update on Scholar Jaina and Horseman Uther

We wanted to update everyone regarding our new hero skins, particularly Scholar Jaina and Horseman Uther. We are planning to add unique voice lines, start of game voice lines, and a couple other special voice lines to both Scholar Jaina and Horseman Uther in a future patch. We’ve taken feedback on board regarding emotes for those and upcoming hero skins. The next skin, which will be released shortly, has new emotes for all 6 regular board interactions and a few other commonly played lines as well. There will be hero skins in the next expansions associated with their corresponding Book of Heroes chapters that will not have unique lines at launch, but we plan to add them as soon as VO recording allows. Stay tuned for updates here.

Adding context as to how we got here: We started out with the idea of adding skins for our classic heroes that allowed us to get more options for visual customization into the hands of our players at a much quicker than normal pace. We’re confident in the idea behind these skins and they’re already seeing a lot of use within the game. However, we missed here on painting a clear picture of the difference between these skins and the alternate heroes we’ve done in the past, that include all sorts of unique audio and visual effects. That’s something we should have gotten across better and want to ensure that we address in the future.

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I’m a bit worried about what this means for future skins. Yes, having it clearly stated what kind of custom effects/voice lines new skins have (like hero skins in HotS) would be great. But personally, limited skins like Scholar Jaina were a little too simple, and I don’t know that quantity makes up for quality in this case.

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This is great news, any chance scholar jaina will come back to the shop then? I didn’t purchase her due to my dissatisfaction with the portrait, but as she is being updated I’d love another chance at purchase!

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Do you intend to add also the unique animations and the personalized frame?

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They checking to see if they’re community cares at all and apparently thanks to this backlash they got their answer but, most likely in the future they will attempt these kinds of strategies again until their community no longer cares and then when that happens BAM! Trump is president.

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I want to second this, I didn’t get the skin due to the feedback. Hope you’re going to put it back up on the shop for the folks who made the cautious (smart) move.

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From memory, this is the first post like this I have made on the official forums.

I have played Hearthstone since it launched. I own every single Hero Portrait.

I am very concerned about the direction that has been taken with Scholar Jaina and Horseman Uther and deeply unhappy with what Blizzard is doing here.

We’re confident in the idea behind these skins

You shouldn’t be, and if you asked your customers how they feel about it you wouldn’t be. Having a basic skin as a 100% free give away may be barely ok, but to stick these two new ones behind a paywall as if they were the real thing is unacceptable.

the difference between these skins and the alternate heroes we’ve done in the past, that include all sorts of unique audio and visual effects

To be clear, you are making a distinction between a new, cheap imitation and the real thing. If you want to give away the cheap imitation to…

get more options for visual customization into the hands of our players at a much quicker than normal pace

…go right ahead. But if you think these less-than versions are going to fly at premium prices now or in the future you are going to have very unhappy customers.

Thanks for listening,

MemeMachine

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TrumpSC, I assume? I’m not sure what modern American politics have to do with a company, especially since they’ve in the past bent over for non-American powers and consumer bases (something which the president Trump is not afraid to say he discourages). But yes. If TrumpSC ran for president, I’d vote for him!

So now they let us know Scholar Jaina will be getting a unique VO after the sale is over?? wtf?! It’s the main reason I didn’t buy it because it seemed lazy on their part and I just couldn’t justify buying a reskin. No matter how much I like Jaina…

I really do hope she goes back to the shop.

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Please put Jaina back in the shop since one of the reasons many of us didn’t buy it is because of no new voice lines.

Also, considering customization, can you please consider making our cardback visible in game, and not hidden in a side pocket?

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I actually really love the Jaina skin, but I know I’m pretty much the only one lol. If you REALLY wanted to do something unforgivable to me, it would probably be to give me a free arena ticket and stick me with 5 gold. People have OCD, people.

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Hey I appreciate listening to the feedback. In a similar vein the Prince Arthas skin is missing incredibly important interactions with the other characters in this game. If your bring voice actors in, can you please add unique interactions for Arthas with characters like Jaina, Illidan, Uther, Kel’thuzad, Sylvanas, and maybe even the Kael’thas card. As a special request could you please make Arthas/Uther interaction be “Glad you could make it Uther” and “Watch your tone with me, boy.” and if possible add the “You may be the prince, but I’m still your superior as a paladin.” although I understand if the second part is too long . That interaction in Warcraft 3 is iconic as i’m sure you guys know. I’m an Arthas fanboy and have been since 2008 when i first played wotlk and it would mean a lot for Arthas fans.

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If you renew the language files now anyway: Could you also spend new voice lines for the 1000 win heroes?

You only get them with a lot of effort and I think they are one of the biggest proofs truly loving Hearthstone. In the past a lot of people were unhappy about using the old voice lines with this hard-to-get heroes , so maybe you can renew them too.

Regards
Madisian

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For 1000 Win portaits id love then if was option. Cause i dont wanna lose valeeras : The pleasure is mine

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I bought both heroes.
But It would be nice for the community, if the skins were sold again for another week, when the new voicelines are out. So that some people can decide whether they want to buy them.

Otherwise people are frustrated, because they missed out on this at first bad deal.

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Cool! I was waiting for it to be fixed before buying it.

So… now that you’ve fixed it where to buy it?

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Adding unique voicelines is definitely a step in the right direction. However, I don’t think animation-less portraits should suddenly now become the norm in terms of purchasable cosmetics, pack bundle included or not. I get that covid has companies strapped and having everyone work from home has an impact on a HUGE variety of businesses, but simply making new portraits into .jpegs (to be hotfixed) and still asking for money for them still feels like a lessening of quality.

Clearly, the code exists for something like Jaina to have a frosty animated hero power, I do not understand why something like that was not implemented.

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while i appreciate that blizz has heard the player base, this response misses the mark.

I see no difference between a new hero and a skin on a classic hero. dont be lazy.

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Reintroduce the skin @Blizzard

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Dude!
LOL… Hilarious.

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